Does the So-Called millennial Generation Have a Rendezvous with Destiny?
The Seattle Times reports Michael Dudley is the son of a preacher man. He's a born-again Christian with several family members in the military. He's voting for Obama. Many traditional younger GOP evangelicals are no longer identifying with the Republican party.
The so-called millennial generation, roughly late teens to early 30s are part of the so-called millennial generation. Bob Herbert writes in the New York Times that this is the generation that's in danger of being left out of the "American Dream." This generation is faced with doing less well than their parents and that economic uncertainty is playing a huge role in forming their views of government and politics.
In 1974 the average income for men in their 30s was $40,000 (using today's inflation-adjusted dollars) - today that amount is $35,000.
According to The Fourth Turning by William Strauss and Neil Howe first published in 1997.
"The next Fourth Turning is due to begin shortly after the new millennium. Around the year 2005, a sudden spark will catalyze a Crisis mood. Remnants of the old social order will disintegrate. Political and economic trust will implode. Real hardship will beset the land, with severe distress that could involve questions of class, race, nation, and empire. Yet this time of trouble will bring seeds of social rebirth. Americans will share a regret about recent mistakes -- and a resolute new consensus about what to do. The very survival of the nation will feel at stake. Sometime before the year 2025, America will pass through a great gate in history, commensurate with the American Revolution, Civil War, and twin emergencies of the Great Depression and World War II.
"The risk of catastrophe will be very high. The nation could erupt into insurrection or civil violence, crack up geographically, or succumb to authoritarian rule. If there is a war, it is likely to be one of maximum risk and efforts -- in other words, a total war.
Roughly 80 years ago was the Great Depression and World War II. Roughly 80 years before that was the Civil War. Roughly 80 years before that, the Revolutionary War. Roughly 80 years before that, Glorious Revolution of 1675-1704. Roughly 80 years before that, the Armada Crisis of 1569-1594. And roughly 80 years before that the War of the Roses (1459-1487)."
In each 80 year period, there are four turnings, produced by each of the four generations. The Fourth Turning is the one of greatest danger, maximum impact upon the world. And it’s due to happen any day now -- if it’s not already underway.
From: www.fourthturning.com:
Strauss and Howe base this vision on a provocative theory of American history as a series of recurring 80- to 100-year cycles. Each cycle has four "turnings"-a High, an Awakening, an Unraveling, and a Crisis. The authors locate today's America as midway through an Unraveling, roughly a decade away from the next Crisis (or Fourth Turning). And they recommend ways Americans can prepare for what's ahead, as a nation and as individuals.
Are we entering Fourth Turning now? Depression, war, chaos and transformation...
"There is a mysterious cycle in human events. To some generations much is given. Of other generations much is expected. This generation of Americans has a rendezvous with destiny."
--Franklin D. Roosevelt
Does this so-called millennial generation have a rendezvous with destiny?
- FILED UNDER: Host Posts
- May 13, 2008
Lieberman and Muslims
I'm copying and pasting Lieberman's article I found today at HuffPost. If we used the word "Jews" each time we see the word "Muslim, or "Islamist." would we not be talking about Adolph Hitler?
Please, please, please, Tom bring this topic up!
I can seldom listen because of work. Thank you very much for today's show.
Carolyn Kennedy, Phd.
Adjunct Professor
Metro State College
Denver, CO
Chip Berlet
Lieberman's Very Serious Muslim-Bashing Senate Report
Posted May 9, 2008 | 06:22 PM (EST)
A bigoted bombshell was lobbed from Inside the Beltway last Thursday when the Senate Committee on Homeland Security under the "leadership" of Committee Chairmen Joseph Lieberman and ranking Republican Susan Collins. The report, "Violent Islamist Extremism, the Internet, and the Homegrown Terrorism Threat," (PDF) combines Muslim bashing with suggestions that would further undermine Consitutional rights in the United States.
Caroline Fredrickson, director of the ACLU Washington Legislative Office, summarized the ACLU response to the awful Lieberman/Collins Senate Committee report:
Though the need to prevent criminal acts of violence is unquestionable, targeting communities based on religious beliefs is unacceptable and unproductive. We will only end up stigmatizing the Islamic community and creating a nation of Islamophobes. We should not be legislating against thought and we should certainly not be regulating religious or unpopular thought. A dynamic debate can only make this country stronger and safer. (More here)
Is Islamophobia something to worry about? I think so. Islamophobia has been simmering of the back burner of Campaign 2008 for some time.
Take the case of Debbie Almontaser in New York. There are lots of statistics and studies, but sometimes a personal story is the best illustration of a problem.
Almontaser was removed as the principal of a new Arab language public school in New York City in 2007. She was thrown to the circling wolves by her own union and the NYC department of education.
Following the September 11 terrorist attacks, Almontaser explains that she began to "help safeguard my Arab, Muslim, and South Asian neighbors in Brooklyn." Aha! Typical! After all, Almontaser is an Arab Muslim immigrant from Yemen. What do you expect? Well, expect more, because Almontaser had already spent years working with a "group of Jews, Palestinians, Muslims, Christians, and others who meet on a monthly basis to talk about world issues and give each other a sense of hope and support. Immediately after September 11, some members of the dialogue called to check up on how my family and I were doing. Based on the concerns and issues I raised, I was invited by these members to go to their churches and synagogues and to speak on behalf of the Arab-American and Muslim communities in Brooklyn."
What got Almontaser fired? She became the target of right-wing media fanatics who used her to whip up fears of terrorist Muslims teaching children to become suicide bombers.
The New York Post and New York Sun led the attacks. Sun columnist Alicia Colon was especially nasty: "So whose insane idea was it to have an Arabic public school in Brooklyn open this September? Are they out of their minds? Have they learned nothing from the Netherlands about the danger of pandering to multiculturalism?"
When I first heard of this proposed school, I thought it was a joke. But then I read Daniel Pipes's column about this disguised 'madrassa' and discovered who the major principals were. Now I can't dispel this feeling of disbelief and outrage. This proposal is utter madness, considering that five years after September 11, ground zero is still a hole in the ground and we're bending over backwards to appease those sympathetic to individuals who would destroy us again. Smart, really smart.
In one online essay, Daniel Pipes, a scholar and anti-Islamic pundit, claimed that Almontaser said, "Arabs or Muslims...are innocent of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001."
The actual quote? Almontaser said "I don't recognize the people who committed the attacks as either Arabs or Muslims.... Those people who did it have stolen my identity as an Arab and have stolen my religion."
The bigoted media feeding frenzy was a disgrace. Months later the New York Times did the right thing and published a thoughtful article titled "Critics Cost Muslim Educator Her Dream School" (online here).
The Bush administration policies in the Middle East have been a disaster, and part of the blowback has been a tragic escalation of both Islamophobic and antisemitic rhetoric in volitile political debates. Muslims are portrayed as a barbarous, tribal force prompting a "Clash of Civiliaztions" in the analysis by Samuel Huntington. Jews loyal to Israel are said to be controlling U.S. foreign policy through the U.S. neoconservative movement and the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad. The lurid and bigoted claims wash across the Internet. Such xenophobia and stereotyping has no place in a country that aspires to be a real democracy.
Debbie Almontaser was engaged in working in Christian, Jewish, and Muslim communities to challenge stereotypes and build bridges across communites. There are several initiatives across the country twinning the issues of Islamophobia and antisemitism. Almontaser, an early leader in such efforts has been slapped down by fanatics. Almontaser is still fighting to clear her name and regain her position in the courts. (Read more about Almontaser and an earlier Witch Hunt here)
It is into this target rich political environment of fear and xenophobia that Lieberman and Collins toss their bombshell report. And they promise more to come. More than fifty years ago, a lawyer representing another target of a political witch hunt confronted the head of an earlier Senate committee: "You have done enough. Have you no sense of decency?"
History may be repeating itself. Time will tell, and history will judge our response.
HuffPost Off the Bus
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/chip-berlet/liebermans-muslim-bashing_b_10...
Happiness? Oh yea, that dreaded
Happiness?
Oh yea, that dreaded mandatory cheerfulness required from most everyone in the United States with the exception of some like Don Rickles (that's what made Rickles act work so well; grumpiness is usually NOT permitted in this nation where we MUST be cheerful or be shunned, fired or disowned!).
.............
The future belongs to those who believe
in the beauty of their dreams.--Eleanor Roosevelt
Irony
Isn't it ironic that the generation who sang about freedom in the streets during the Sixties is responsible for all of today's repression? Won't it be ironic that the generation which was underestimated might very well be the same generation that saves the country?
Metal Head
re: irony
I have read all of the Generation books. All generations will have their roll to fill if we are to get out of this with a positive outcome.
Once I said something about how my (Boomer) generation messed the world up for my Millennial daughter's generation. She told me those of my generation that believed in peace and justice didn't mess things up. Those people didn't try for power and control. Those members of my generation who didn't sing "about freedom in the streets" and instead strove for the money and power messed things up. The rest of us raised Liberal kids that still believe in a we society.
Peace. :-)
Bruce